There have been a number of movies made on the Second World War, with some of them such as ‘Deer Hunter’, Apocalypse Now’, ‘Platoon’, and recently ‘Forrest Gump’ having attained iconic status. A lot of these movies have now focused on the severe trauma of battle, with the physical and mental affect on the people involved. Many of them have been very brutal in their depiction of the actual war scenes, and were far from the jingoistic patriotic depiction of war (and this could be because of the Vietnam War being a very controversial war, with opinion being divided on whether this war was even necessary). Movies made on the second world war have not faced this moral dilemma, and hence have not focused so much on the trauma (with even the ultra-realistic movie such as ‘Saving Private Ryan’ and the ‘Thin Red Line’ showing the horror of war, but staying away from a mental deterioration of the soldiers involved).

Patton was a movie made on a heavily decorated (and highly controversial) soldier of the War, General George S Patton (Wikipedia) (played by George C. Scott). General Patton was a major architect in the victory for the US Army in the Second World War, with his passion for discipline, and his fast movement through Europe after the Normandy Landings. He also played a key role in the missions in Morocco expanding to other parts of North Africa, and then Sicily. Another of his great missions was in deceiving the Germans about the actual landing of the Allied forces in Europe, with the ‘Operation Fortitude’ being designed to convince the Germans that Patton was the head of an army that would attack through the French town of Calais. They were successful in this deception, with the Germans being unconvinced of the landing at Normandy.
Patton was a person who was not very well liked by his troops, with his emphasis on discipline, and a strong focus on the mission. He was not particularly fond of humour directed against him either. However, he was a General whom the Germans had feared because of his strong and pretty effective tactics; his focus on making the breakout in the push into France and then Germany in a fast and very mobile manner (they were only stopping because they ran out of fuel) prevented the Germans from being able to recoup.
The film starts off with a resounding speech by George Scott with an massive American Flag behind him; this opening speech and the entire shot has become iconic. The movie fairly accurately captures the nature of the General as we get to see the military life-story of the General in the War, with his successes in North Africa, and then in Sicily. After getting into trouble due to having slapped a soldier (and with Eisenhower forcing him to apologize for that incident), he comes back into action after the Normandy landing. The movie also captures the rapid downfall of this celebrated soldier after that, when his biases against the Russians (although his opinion of what would happen in East Europe after the Soviets took control came true), his tolerating of the ex-Nazis in German areas under his control, and his outbursts subsequently led to his losing his position.
The movie was a success, and also won 7 Oscars:
- Best Actor (George Scott refused to accept, considering the awards to be a meat parade of actors)
- Best Art Direction-Set Decoration,
- Best Director,
- Best Film Editing,
- Best Picture,
- Best Sound and
- Best Writing, Story and Screenplay Based on Factual Material or Material Not Previously Published or Produced
Nominations:
- Best Cinematography,
- Best Effects,
- Special Visual Effects and
- Best Music, Original Score

The movie was directed by . It stars George C. Scott, Karl Malden, Michael Bates, and Karl Michael Vogler. It was directed by Franklin J. Schaffner, and was based on a script by Francis Ford Coppola and Edmund H. North.

The Metropolis was a movie that was seemingly way ahead of its time. It’s a movie about the conflict between the rulers (the technologically advanced class) and the the workers who toiled to provide for it all (and who were seen as the subjugated sections of the population). Metropolis depicted this scenario, set in the year 2026, with hugely futuristic settings. The movie was not something that is easily viewable in its original creation - it was deemed too long (at 210 minutes), ruthlessly chopped and modified for multiple reasons (whether to it into the 90 minutes allowed by theatre owners, or because parts of the subject were deemed too controversial in the United States, or because the sound era started soon after and the movie was adjusted in terms of frames per second to fit into the sound compatible format). In addition, parts of the original movie were found in Argentina, and parts of the original movie were never recovered.

The movie was made in Germany, as probably one of the earliest great science fiction movies, made by Austrian-German director Fritz Lang and one of the most expensive movies of that era, costing around 7 million Reichsmarks at that time (approx $200 million as of now). The movie was written by Lang and his wife Thea von Harbou (in a twist, the movie was praised by the Nazis, and Thea soon became an ardent Nazis; she and Lang finally divorced in 1934).
The society of 2026 was divided into 2 rigid groups with the planners living in luxury, and the workers toiling underground in pretty bad conditions. The skyline has plenty of Gothic style skyscrapers (probably inspiring the Tyrell towers in the classy Bladerunner made much later). The city is run by Johann ‘Joh’ Fredersen (Alfred Abel), who looks for ways to ensure that the workers remain in their conditions. However, there is a charismatic and beautiful lady, Maria (Brigitte Helm), who advises the workers against trying for a revolt, and instead wait for the arrival of a figure known as the ‘Mediator’. It is the Mediator who will bring together these 2 separate sections of society and improve the conditions of the workers. She has an admirer, Frederson’s own son, Freder (Gustav Fröhlich), who is disgusted at the conditions in which the workers toil and live, and joins Maria’s cause.
And then starts the true future. The scientist and old rival of Fredersen, Rotwang (Rudolf Klein-Rogge), builds a robot in the shape of Maria. He uses this robot to first preach discord in the young rich men of Metropolis and then descends to the underground sections where the robot inspires rebellion in the workers. In this rebellion, they destroy the important ‘Heart Machine’ and then realize that the destruction in turn causes the flooding of their own quarters. They chase Maria, and burn her, and then realize that she is a robot. The real Maria is chased by Rotwang, and followed by Freder, and in the climatic end, Rotwang falls to his death; and Freder carries out his destiny of being the Mediator by uniting Frederson with the workers.

Robert Ludlum wrote a lot about conspiracies of power and attempting to take control, a subject that was very popular in the 60’s and 70’s with all the talk of the rise of the arms-industrial complex and associated industries; the good part is that he was able to weave a good storyline that kept a person compelled to read the book. Ludlum’s books had many things in common, they had a fast paced action, they always had many top level people involved, including surprises where some of the people were not expected to be a part of the conspiracy, but they were.
The Materese Circle involves 2 brutal and skilled enemies, Vasili Taleniekov from the Soviet Union, and Brandon Alan Scofield from the US State Dept Consular Relations. These 2 are killers who have killed people loved by either one of them, and hate each other in a visceral way. And they are the 2 main suspects from either side when valuable people on tne US (the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff) and Soviet (a very renowned scientist) side are assassinated in a brutal way. Suspicion immediately falls onto the other, and is only neautralized when the leaders of either countries calls the other.

Both of these are killers are now getting slightly old, maybe not of so much use to their country’s intelligence community, but still have the talent. However, little do they know about the way that their life is going to be turned. They are soon going to be getting information about a massive conspiracy, called the Materese Circle, spun by an old Corsican rich man and coming to full active life now. The conspiracy has its own troops, its own assassins and its own leaders, and they will stop at nothing to remove the ones they want to remove from their path. The Materese leaders are the ones who are orchestrating the international terrorism community (one must remember this was before the time of the Al-Qaeda), and is now moving towards getting control of both Moscow and Washington DC, and it is very difficult to stop them.
Taleniekov learns of these facts from an old friend who is dying after a visit from a killer of the Matarese Circle, and finds it hard to believe all this conspiracy, and when told to work with Scofield, refuses; but soon things are moving to get them together. Both these skilled killers are, under instructions from Matarese Men, sentenced to death by their respective Governments, no capture, no interrogation, just execution. Eventually, these 2 old enemies, get together (in an incredible episode of violence where they manage to kill the assassins sent to kill them). They travel to the Island of Corsica to learn more, and learn a fair deal more about the origins of the group called the Matarese. They are pursued relentlessly by the Matarese, who don’t hesitate to kill friends and loved ones of these 2.
At the same time, these 2 are getting closer to the source, and eventually manage to reach their target, and in a final burst of violence, manage to eliminate the Matarese council, even as the Soviet is lost in this final carnage. Read the book for its fast paced flow, for the story that could seem realistic in a different time and that is very gripping.

Cape Fear was a movie released in 1991, based on an earlier movie made in 1962 (with some differences). The 1991 movie was made by famed director Martin Scorsese (a tidbit of continuity between the 1962 and the 1991 movie is that some of the main characters of the 1962 movie, Gregory Peck, Robert Mitchum, and Martin Balsam also starred in the 1961 movie, but in a different role. Another tidbit is that the 1991 movie was Gregory Peck’s final movie, well almost, he relinquished his retirement temporarily in the 1998 remake of his Moby Dick).

The film received critical acclaim, and also did well at the box office. The movie was a dark depiction of the theme of revenge that makes a ex-convict stalk, threaten and violently attack the person whom he believes is responsible for the time he spends in prison, and also threaten his family.
It is also true that the depiction of people in movies made recently show them as having different shades of character, not only black or white. So, in the 1962 movie, the central character of Sam Bowden was much less complex than the character shown in the 1991 film; here he is shown to have several flaws in his character. Additionally, the ex-convict Max Cady is shown to be justified in getting angry at what had been done to him by his own defense lawyer; his lawyer had hidden a document that could have turned the case and caused Cady to be convicted and sent to jail for 14 years for rape.
The movie is all about the desire for revenge, culminating in a final horrific scene of confrontation in an isolated house in stormy conditions. Max Cady (Robert De Niro in an Oscar nominated role) was being tried for the rape and battery of a 16 year old, and in the trial he was defended by the public defender Sam Bowden (Nick Nolte). Cady is illiterate and does not realize that his lawyer had hidden a document that stated that the vitim was promiscuous, something that might have lessened the charge due to doubts about whether the intercourse was consensual or forced.
Now, 14 years later, Max Cady has learnt a lot about the law, and also learnt that his lawyer had not defended him well. He wants revenge on Bowden (and his family) who live in a quiet small town in North Carolina. It is this stalking of Bowden and the sheer venom that De Niro projects that makes this movie great.

For fans watching current action movies, Computer Generated Graphics seem very smooth, barely visible as being different from the flow of the movie. However, there was a time when such CG were rough, easily discernible and unable to handle complicated effects. And then came this movie, Terminator 2: Judgment Day in 1991. The Computer Graphics used in this movie were plain revolutionary, done by a firm called Industrial Light and Magic. This was the turning point in the world of cinema, where the effects used were incredible, causing awe in the minds of fans who would have seen such effects for the first time.
The movie was an incredible success for many reasons. It generated very positive critical acclaim, earned a lot of money worldwide - more than $500 million (even though the movie was the most expensive movie ever made at that point of time, costing approx $100 million), and earned very high reputations for its director James Cameron (who became known for his Midas touch, making the Titanic later, which earned over a $1 billion), as well as for Arnold Schwarzenegger.

The movie also earned 4 Academy Awards (truth to say, these were all technical awards - the Academy would never have given any of the picture or acting awards to such an out and out commercial movie). These awards were:
Best Sound,
Best Make Up,
Best Visual Effects, and
Best Sound Editing
The movie takes off from the first Terminator picture. It has now been 10 years since the incidents of the first terminator movie, and the machines decide to play their hand again. They send an advanced model to kill the young John Connor (Edward Furlong), so that the insurrection happening much later can be stopped. This time, the humans do not send a human to protect him, but instead send a modified Terminator series cyborg (similar to the killer of the first machine). The terminator sent by the machines is an advanced machine, capable of changing itself into different forms and shapes (using a technology called liquid metal) - although it cannot convert itself into more complex machinery such a gun. It is still as ruthless as ever, single-minded in its quest to kill John Connor.
John Connor lives with foster parents since his real mother Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton) has been committed to a psychiatric institution given that she would forever keep on warning about a future man vs. machine war - something that John is very cynical about. There is a climatic sequence very early in the movie when the terminator and the protector cyborg both locate John, and Arnold is able to save him. This was actually the first time that the audience learned that the feared terminator from the first movie is actually a savior.
John learns very early that he is in the cross-hairs of a powerful terminator. He also learns that his mother would be the next target, and manages to order / persuade the savior terminator (Arnold) to save his mother. They reach there, and as soon as Sarah sees the terminator, she is terrified, but is convinced by John that he is there to help. They manage to outrun the advanced model (T-1000). Arnold tells her more about how Skynet was set up, as well as the creator of the network. They soon reach their weapons arsenal, with John trying to understand more about the terminator.
Sarah is over-wrought and soon sets out to kill Miles Bennett Dyson (Joe Morton), the creator of Skynet, and almost succeeds, but John and the Terminator reach there in time. They team up with Miles to destroy whatever he has done; however, in the effort Miles gets killed and blows up the complex. And then follows a thrilling chase where the T1000 chases Sarah, John, and the Terminator. This involves a helicopter, a big liquid nitrogen truck (and the viewers get to see one of the incredible special effects of the movie - the T1000 assembling itself from a pool of solid -> melting to form liquid metal). There are some fight scenes, but in the end, it is a battle to the end. How do John and Sarah survive the fearsome might of the T1000 ?

Movies that are based on science are sometimes successful (take Spielberg’s movies - Close Encounters.., ET, Back to the Future, etc), but many more are unsuccessful. All of these movies portray science as not very hostile, and then came in the hard science fiction movies, with Aliens and The Terminator being movies that were more action oriented, less warm and fuzzy, and very successful. For example, The Terminator cost around $6.5 million to make, and earned around $78 million worldwide. It was a critical success as well, and set the stage for sequels to be made. The movie also played a big part in making Arnold Schwarzenegger that super-star that he became.

The irony around this is that Schwarzenegger was not the first choice for the role, the role of the terminator was initially envisaged to be a small person, not particularly unremarkable. Schwarzenegger was first offered the role of the human from the future, but there was a realization that Schwarzenegger was better suited for the role of the terminator, and that automatically made the role of the terminator to be a big muscular man.
The movie is based on the concept of a future where the machines rule and the humans are fighting back, led by a brave and great hero, John Connor. The machines are able to plan a great deal, including creating robots with living tissue over a metal skeleton (cyborg) in order to better infiltrate the rebel humans, but are unable to score a clear victory. And then the machine leader, the intelligent network Skynet, thinks of a diabolical plan (although would be apparent to anybody in the age of time travel). A cyborg is sent back to 1984 to kill the mother of the rebel leader, Sarah Connor (based in Los Angeles). The humans are able to also send back a rebel soldier, Kyle Reese, to try and protect her.
And thus start the action. The cyborg is a robot, it cannot be reasoned with, it cannot be destroyed with small arms fire, and is ruthless. The robot starts with the phone book, where 3 Sarah Connors are listed. It kills the first 2, and is hunting for the third. When he is trying to kill the third, she is protected by Kyle, who explains his mission and who the cyborg actually is. He can only use current machinery since time travel did not allow him to get back superior weapons, a handicap against the cyborg, aka the Terminator.
When the terminator attacks again, there is a chase, where they are arrested. Typically, the police see a number of weirdos every day, and if you start to spin a story about a robot from the future trying to kill, then it is unlikely that you will be believed, especially if being examined by a shrink. And so their story is not believed. The terminator arrives at the police station and asks for Sarah and Kyle, but is thwarted. Then comes an epic one liner, “I’ll be back !”, and so he does, attaching the police station with a powerful vehicle.
A full scale attack on a police station ? The police fight back, but against a terminator incapable of being killed by their weapons, useless. The terminator kills 17 policeman, but Reese manages to escape with Sarah. They try to hide at a motel where Reese shows Sarah how to make pipe bombs. The scene turns a bit romantic, no doubt furthered by the close escape from the terminator, and they make love (ending up conceiving the future leader, John).
The Terminator manages to track them down, and the situation is now near the end-game. Reese is wounded in the attack, but are able to attack the terminator with a bomb, causing extensive damage to its metal skeleton. However, even the remaining shell of the skeleton is after them, and they escape into a factory. Reese manages to destroy the legs of the Terminator, but at the cost of his own life. It is Sarah who finally destroys the upper part of the skeleton in a machine press, where finally the terminator is killed / terminated / made inactive.
The movie ends with scenes showing Sarah preparing for the future, pregnant with Reese’s son (who will become John), traveling in Mexico, staring into an uncertain future.
The movie has a big cycle around time that could confuse you if you started thinking around it. The man who will save the rebel humans is John Connor, son of Sarah Connor and Kyle Reese. Reese in turn is a man from the future, who only came into Sarah’s life because he was sent back by John. This is a cycle, with no start and end.

Some years back, the quest to make limitless energy from the concept of cold fusion seemed like the answer to our energy ills; it was propounded as the next frontier in research - unfortunately, the entire research imploded in a drama of falsehood and accusations. The Saint, use the theme of cold fusion as the central scientific thread running through the movie. However, the movie is more than that. It gives the 2 main characters of Val Kilmer and Elizabeth Shue a good platform to display their acting abilities, and I liked Val Kilmer in this role.
The Saint is not a new concept, being based on the main characters of Simon Templar in the series of books (created in 1928) by Leslie Charteris; these books were published under the series ‘The Saint’. These series finally ended in 1983, and also found their way into multiple movies, a radio series of the 1940’s, a British television series starring Roger Moore, and others.

In a slight deviation from the original, this movie does not have the hero claiming to be the character from the book, but the name is instead combined from 2 names, Simon from Simon Magus, and Templar from the Knights Templar, a medieval sect of warriors. The movie also had an interesting twist; in the original version, the female lead, Dr. Emma Russell is killed and Simon Templar goes back to do battle, to avenge her, leading to a final climatic battle with guns, tanks, exploding oil, and so on. However, test audiences did not like this ending, and the movie ending had to be changed drastically, ending in the current form.
The movie has a fair amount of adventure and action, with some amount of unbelievability. To be able to get into the Russian President’s bedroom, bypassing his entire security, and that too without much external support seems somewhat difficult, but the Saint managed it without too much effort.
The movie is essentially about the scientific efforts of Dr. Emma Russell, who is developing the formula for cold fusion, and has achieved some success in it. On the other hand, there is Simon, who has been tormenting the British police with his various heists, committed under different names (each name being that of a different saint). He has one final heist left so that he can reach the $50 million mark. This comes to him in the form of a Russian oligarch, Ivan Tretiak, who wants to get the Presidency of the Russian Federation, and wants to hire The Saint to steal it. After some hesitation, when threatened with the death of Dr. Emma, Simon agrees to do it.
He woos Dr. Emma, steals it and then turns it overs to Ivan. It is however incomplete. In the meantime, Dr. Emma comes to Moscow after him; and Tretiak is now after both of them.
The action gets more heated up, and leads to the Russian President’s bedroom where Simon bursts in, and then Tretiak and his son comes in to capture both of them. Tretiak plans to expose the President’s wasteful expenditure in buying such a formula in a show trial. However, during this process, the missing part of the formula is released, and the experiment is shown to be a grand success. The President quickly resumes power. There is a final tease scene where The Saint shows himself to British police, and then meets Dr. Emma.

The US military involvement in Vietnam was an experience that even decades later is recalled as a phase to avoid. Every military engagement by the US is vetted to see that the US should not get involved the same way that it got involved in Vietnam. The US military had a humiliating defeat when it was forced to retreat from Vietnam, and did not get its true spirit back till the defeat of Saddam Hussain in the First Gulf Way in 1991. The US dogma (including any required military effort) to beat back the ascendancy of Communism around the world is seen as the primary reason for the involvement in the Vietnam War. Given the impact of the Vietnam War on the US psyche during the 1970’s and after, it was natural to expect many many movies to be made on the subject, and some great movies have been made.

Some of the movies have been ‘Good morning Vietnam’, ‘Apocalypse Now’, ‘The Deer Hunter’, ‘Full Metal Jacket’, ‘Forrest Gump’, etc. A lot of these movies have been dark movies, such as ‘Apocalypse Now’, a very dark portrayal of the madness of war and what such a war does to the people involved. Similarly, Platoon is a dark depiction of war, of the changes wrought in the innocent young men who went to war, and whom the war turned into cynical, moody and mentally wrought people. A whole generation of young men were taken from their families, drafted into the war, and turned into hard, battle weary men. Platoon takes a glimpse of what war life must be for a few of these young men. Oliver Stone, who served as an American soldier in war, takes his experiences and creates his most famous and acclaimed movie. This is the movie that made Stone’s reputation.
The movie made an equally good impression on a large section of the critics, and also got a good share of the Oscars, winning 4, and getting nominated for others.
Won: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Film Editing, and Best Sound
Nominated: Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Tom Berenger), Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Willem Dafoe), Best Cinematography and Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen.
At the time of release, the Vietnam War had been over for more than a decade, and a new generation of Americans were not so aware of the mood of the country in the late 60’s and 70’s. At such a time, the release of such a movie that portrayed the war as a brutal war that sapped the human spirit, and portrayed the impact on individual members of the platoon would have been akin to a shocking reminder of what the war must have been like. In addition, the movie did not present things in stark black and white, with a large amount of moral ambiguity through the movie. Even the protagonist, a person who does not sway too much from the right side, eventually kills in cold blood, not during a conflict, and out of hate. Further, the depiction of the massacre in a village, modeled after the ‘My Lai’ village massacre during the Vietnam War is meant to shock.
The movie takes Chris Taylor (Charlie Sheen), a young upper middle-class American dropping out of college to join the war because he feels that there is an unfair policy where rich kids are getting deferment to join the war because of their education, while poorer background young men are being sent to join the war. However, any romanticism of the war is soon lost in the actual combat zone, whether due to the mundaneness of digging foxholes or in an actual conflict situation (where a fellow soldier dies in the cross-fire). The movie also shows the contrasting impact of the war on people with the depiction of 2 Sergeants, Sgt. Elias and Staff Sgt. Barnes. Elias (William Dafoe in an Oscar nominated role) is a squad leader who has not been corrupted by the war and maintains his essential humanity. He almost dies a death at the hands of his own countrymen when he is shot by Barnes (Tom Berenger) in the middle of battle, eventually being killed by the Vietnamese while fleeing from them in a wounded state. Barnes himself is shot by Taylor after a major combat action in revenge for the killing of Elias. Barnes is an example of what human being can become who cracks under the pressure of war and goes to the dark side. Another major highlight of the movie is the dependence of soldiers on good leadership with the platoon having an inept leadership in the form of Lt. Wolfe (apparently Lt. Wolfe is used in US army training as an example of how not to command).

Most people would have heard of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, at the same time, a vast majority of the same people would have little or no knowledge of the background of the conflict; or of the history of the region of the region at the time of the founding of Israel in 1948. The conflict has split people so widely that it is hard to find people who do not have a bias on the subject. The same is true of people who have written on the topic. In the midst of all this, to find a book that details the history of the region in a relatively unbiased way is difficult. This book is a very close approximation of the detailing of the history of that region that seeks to present history without too much bias.

Jerusalem is without doubt the most disputed territory in the world, and still at the center of Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Even now, most Islam inspired terrorists consider the cause of Jerusalem to be central to the conflict. Jerusalem is the holiest of holies for Jews, the site of the destructed Second Temple (and the remaining Western Wall from that temple); in addition, the same complex contains the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa mosque, the third holiest site for Muslims (said to house the rock from which the prophet Mohammed ascended to heaven on his horse along with the archangel Gabriel); to round off the religious significances, Jerusalem also contains the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, built on the grounds that are venerated as the place where Jesus was said to have been crucified and buried. It is not hard to imagine why the city of Jerusalem has always been a much sought over city.
To write a book about such a place is not easy. Such a book will be reviewed very critically, examined for bias, and every historical fact mentioned checked. To ensure that they did a good job, the authors, Dominique Lapierre and Larry Collins, spent 5 years of research, checking historical documents and records. The overall aim was to write a book that aims to provide details of the facts and circumstances surrounding the creation of the state of Israel - to that extent, the book presents details of all the chief players of that time - the Arabs, the British who had the mandate of the region of Palestine, and the various players on the Jewish side (simple soldiers, religious leaders, the leaders (David Ben-Gurion, Golda Meir), as well as the various organizations on the Jewish side (Hagannah, Irgun, Stern)).
The book itself starts from the time when the United Nations (in 1947) voted to partition the British mandate of Palestine into 2 parts - one to be the state of the Jews called Israel, and the other to be a Palestine state. However, both sides knew that this was not the end, there would be a war; and both sides prepared for war. So, for example, Israel sent its men abroad to buy arms and needed to setup an army and air force that could hold up its own against the might of its Arab neighbors. Similarly, the Arabs went to buy arms, and also worked at ensuring that all the constituents of the Arab side worked together. As the end of the mandate came closer, war became more imminent. It was also an intelligence war, something that Israel eventually won and won the entire battle (the Israeli objective was to retain their homeland, and they managed to do so). One consequence of the battle was to create a huge number of Palestinian refugees, the problem of which is a major impediment to any peaceful solution even now.

On the Waterfront is a movie that is more than 50 years old now, but it can still make an impact. The movie was an incredible career booster for Marlon Brando, giving him a massive reputation in the Oscar-winning role of a man who was just passing through life as a ‘bum’, being the lackey of a mob boss in the union, until a couple of deaths and the inspiring words of a priest and the sister of one of the ones killed caused his conscience to slowly come back to life and get him to do the right thing. The movie portrays an end full of optimism, with the breaking of the control of the mob boss who controlled the union of longshoremen. The whole situation was that of exploitation of the dock workers, and corruption and use of force in order to retain the control of the boss.

This movie had a certain amount of history in terms of reasons for it being made. The movie was directed by Elia Kazan; he was controversial because he had reported names of possible communists in the American film industry in 1952 (2 years before the making of this movie) to the House Un-American Activities Commission, and he had been criticized for this action. The release of a movie in which the hero breaks the might of a mighty corrupt and evil authority by ’squealing’ / ‘telling the truth’ before a Government commission investigating the waterfront was seen as an answer to the claims made earlier against Kazan that he was a squealer.
Around the period in which the movie was made, the scene of the waterfront was indeed a place of oppression in which ordinary workers had no dignity, only those got jobs whom the boss of the union decided or were in his favor, and there was a systematic exploitation of these workers. The movie was actually based on a Pulitzer Prize winning series of 24 articles in 1949 in the New York Sun by reporter Malcolm Johnson called ‘Crime on the Waterfront’. The article was a harsh expose on the scene on the waterfront, detailing bribery, corruption, payoffs, kickbacks to union officials, theft, murder and a generally oppressive culture.
The movie was seen as such a striking movie with its portrayal of the activities on the waterfront, a great melodrama, and an incredible performance by Marlon Brando that it was nominated for a total of 12 nominations and won 8 nominations, putting it at a very pedestral in terms of awards won:
* Best Actor - Marlon Brando
* Best Picture - Sam Spiegel, producer
* Best Supporting Actress - Eva Marie Saint
* Best Art Direction - Set Decoration, Black-and-White - Richard Day
* Best Cinematography, Black-and-White - Boris Kaufman
* Directing - Elia Kazan
* Film Editing - Gene Milford
* Writing, Story and Screenplay - Budd Schulberg
Nominations that did not win
* Best Supporting Actor - Lee J. Cobb
* Best Supporting Actor - Karl Malden
* Best Supporting Actor - Rod Steiger
* Music Score of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture - Leonard Bernstein

The movie is about a former boxer Terry Malloy who is somewhat slow-witted. He manages to survive by being the odd job man for the union boss Johnny Friendly. His brother Charles Malloy, is the lawyer for Johnny Friendly. He is just content doing jobs given to him by the union boss and for his pleasure, rears pigeons. The chief property of the union is that no information is to be given to outsiders about anything, a policy of D n D (Deaf and Dumb) - similar to the mafia code of omerta. But, another young dock worker is about to report whatever he knows to an investigating committee, and this trouble-maker needs to be eliminated. Terry is used to call him, and then this young worker Joey is then thrown off a roof by 2 of the boss’s henchmen. This horrified Terry, since he is the conduit through which Joey was called to his death.
Slowly things start changing due to the impact of a local priest who is trying to rouse the workers from their lethargy; and more so due to a slowly forming attraction between Terry and Edie (sister of the dead Joey). Both Friendly and Charles see this change starting to happen in Terry, but are unable to stop him. Over a period of time, Terry starts to feel his conscience starts to awaken and he starts to shrug off his sluggish nature. He in fact almost breaks with his brother by blaming him for the way his life had turned out (his brother had asked him to throw a match against another boxer and his life had taken a turn for the worse after that).
Towards the end, his brother is killed by Friendly because of being unable to prevent Terry from giving tetimony, and Terry goes ahead and implicated Friendly in the death of Joey. In a bruising scene after that on the waterfront, Terry fights Friendly and then his henchmen, and gets badly beaten up. However, he has the ultimate triumph when the other workers all line up behind him and throw off the fear of the union boss.